


Hold Breath

by Lucky_Guardian



Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game), Dungeons & Dragons - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Drinking, Gen, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Injury Recovery, Inspired by Roleplay/Roleplay Adaptation, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Nightmares, Original Character(s), Scars, Swearing, Trauma, phantom pains
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-05
Updated: 2020-11-05
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:21:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27394903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lucky_Guardian/pseuds/Lucky_Guardian
Summary: Lizardfolk Feature: Hold Breath. You can hold your breath for up to 15 minutes at a time.Like other lizardfolk, Barace Kennald can hold their breath for a long time. This is an ability she usually doesn't have to use much, but when lingering pain from scars around her neck and chest make it hurt to breath sometimes, she begins instinctively holding her breath until the discomfort fades.Only problem is, the rest of the party are not lizardfolk and noticing one of their friends not breath for several minutes is quite concerning.
Kudos: 6
Collections: A Ballad of Seas and Ships





	Hold Breath

Barace Kennald can hold her breath for exactly fifteen minutes and twenty-seven seconds. She tested it herself; bored one day back at the tower and curious about her physical limits. It’s merely a feature of being a lizardfolk, something that comes just as naturally to her body as swimming or learning how to speak Draconic. Like many of her lizardfolk abilities though, the ability to hold their breath is not one that Barace finds needed often. At least, not in the past.

They’ve been doing it more often now.

There are scars around their neck, all the way up and down their torso, and scattered on their muzzle; all from the night hag. The night after the incident, Barace woke up from a nightmare and pain spiked in the wounds all of a sudden. Though she started out breathing heavily from panic, movement in her chest only caused more pain, so instinctively she just… stopped. The pain faded down to a dull throb long before the fifteen minute mark, so there was never a concern from her about running out of breath.

In the morning, they talked to Den about the day before. The conversation helped put Barace’s mind more at ease, and she didn’t have a nightmare quite as bad as the first one after that, but that didn’t mean that the nightmares stopped altogether, or the pain flares.

It was easier, Barace found, that when she woke with aching wounds and the lingering, fearful feeling that she had forgotten something very important, to just stay still and wait for the pain to fade, then take some deep breaths. Usually it only happened in the middle of the night or early enough in the morning, and thus avoided causing any significant trouble.

It was fine. They were fine.

When The Destiny Weavers arrived to Dhordir, Sapic and Varick went right to the tavern while the other three visited Den’s guild. They didn’t linger there long, Den quickly growing concerned for the trouble the tortle and kobold could get into, so the group reunited at the tavern before long.

Den’s suspicions were correct, of course. The trio arrived to the aftermath of a drinking contest which evidently ended with Varick losing, and to the end of a story the barkeep was telling Sapic; a story about Den that they were not happy had been told.

Sapic giggled, “heeeeyy Den~” she sang, amusement crinkling her features into the biggest grin.

She didn’t need to get another word out of her mouth for it to be clear that she was about to start teasing Den about whatever story she had been told. Predicting this, Den hastily marched up to the tortle. Sapic bit at him, but missed and Den grabbed her beak, forcing it shut.

Barace flinched at the act. She couldn’t breathe.

The moment passed quickly. Den released their hands from Sapic’s mouth, scowling at her. She only continued giggling, though didn’t spill whatever gossip she had gotten.

Part of Barace relaxed at Sapic’s reaction, though the rest of her was still tense and feeling some discomfort in her scars. It was just all in good fun, Barace told themself, it’s just like the insults they sometimes give each other, they’re just teasing; you’re overreacting. Despite silently arguing with herself, that certainly wasn’t enough to stop the pain, and it was soon joined by guilt. Comparing something Den did to the night hag wasn’t fair to them; Barace knew Den was much better than that, Den wasn’t going to hurt any of them. Besides, logically, Den didn’t even have claws, they couldn’t have hurt Sapic like the night hag hurt Barace even if they wanted to; which Barace knew they didn’t.

Staying silent on the matter, Barace headed over to the short table to sit with the group. By request, they were all able to get larger chairs to sit on. Though this made it awkward to actually use the table, it was more comfortable to sit in a chair better made for their height, and in Barace’s case, sitting in a position that put her knees up to her chest sounded very uncomfortable right now.

Then they ordered some food and waited for it to be prepared. Zevas muttered about some thoughts on the gnoll problem in Dhordir, but until the party went to the chancellors to ask for more details, his ideas weren’t able to progress too far without the additional information. Den spoke briefly about Dhordir, and about sleeping arrangements for the night, but that conversation didn’t go that far either, especially with Varick barely unconscious and thus unable to contribute his opinion on where he wanted to sleep tonight. It too, was a conversation that could be had later anyway.

It was then that Varick slurred something about going to beat Sapic, too drunk to comprehend that he had lost a long time ago, to which she laughed at.

“So, it was another drinking contest then,” Barace confirmed.

“Yup! Wassn’t gonna ‘ave one, but ‘e wanted to, and I’m not one to turn down a challenge!” Sapic responded, “little thing barely lasted six drinks, ha!”

Zevas smirked slightly, though it seemed his attention was elsewhere. In any case, he didn’t have to say anything for the others to know that he was being smug about faring better than Varick against Sapic in a drinking contest. The kobold in question mumbled incomprehensibly into the table.

Barace frowned at the party’s continued shitty drinking habits, but went back to staying quiet. Resting a hand on the table, she let Cilio climb down the sleeve of her new robes and sit in the palm of her hand. He sniffed at their fingers, tickling the scales with his whiskers, and Barace allowed themself to relax more with the comfort of their familiar being near.

However, barely a couple minutes passed before Barace began to feel uneasy about the wavering stare of Zevas on her. They had thought, at first, that he had just zoned out in thought, but now they could tell that, no, it was in fact her that he was directly and purposefully looking at.

“Barace,” Zevas said, and Barace found that she didn’t like hearing her name in that tone from him. “...Are you breathing?”  


Barace stiffened as the attention was drawn to her about this particular detail, and her fingers closed around Cilio somewhat. He curled his tail around her pinkie finger in ratty support. Now conscious of her breathing, since it had been pointed out, she realized that, in fact, she had stopped breathing at some point without even realizing.

Of course Zevas would be the one to notice. He had likely the greatest perception skills out of all of them. Minor details like breathing would be something for him to pick up on.

“I can hold my breath for fifteen minutes,” she said, as if that answered Zevas’s question in the slightest.

They didn’t even need to look at Den to see the concern taking hold on the half-elf’s face, and it only made her heart clench with more guilt.

“Y’know... if you're starting a ‘holding your breath’ contest, you kinda have to announce that,” Sapic commented brightly, though she was still, somehow, sober enough to allow some worry of her own to make the joke fall flat.

“She started doing it after Den held Sapic’s mouth shut,” Zevas went on when Barace didn’t say anything else, and she shot him a frown.

Den immediately sagged with understanding, “aw, Barace, I-”

“Nooooo, Den, it’s not your fault...” Barace interrupted, “I didn’t even know I was doing it… I’m fine, I- I’m… I just...” They trailed off, anxiously beginning to pet the rat in her hand with a finger. “...It just happens.”

An awkward silence took hold on the members at the table. Barace stared at Cilio as they stewed in their feelings, desperate for something to remedy the tension that had been created. Eventually, they hesitantly spoke up again.

“Sapic, does the injury on your neck ever just… start hurting again?” she asked, addressing Sapic, as while Varick too had been badly wounded in the night hag fight, he was too drunk to focus enough on the conversation.

Sapic paused, and then sighed, reaching for her mug of alcohol and taking a long drink from it. Perhaps under other circumstances, she would have buried her own feelings and brushed off Barace’s question, but whether from the alcohol already in her system or something else, Sapic answered.

“Sometimes, yeah,” she admitted, “stretch my neck and pain flares up for awhile. A tree branch brushed by my face the other day and some part o’ me must’ve thought it was claws ‘cause the scar started aching.”

Zevas nodded sagely, “mmm, phantom pains. The lingering effects of a hard-fought battle.” He leaned back in his chair. “It’s part of the healing process.”

Varick added a comment of his own, but his speech at the moment barely resembled words, and not much of a message could be gleaned from what he said. Still, his efforts at contributing to the conversation were appreciated.

“Oh,” Barace murmured; she had likely heard of phantom pains like this in all her studies of medicine, but it had slipped her mind as something that could happen to them.

“Well, I’m still sorry ‘bout that,” Den apologized, their tone running deeper than just guilt over this single incident.

“It’s not your fault,” Barace repeated.

“I can still be more careful in the future,” Den insisted, “we all can.”

“We’ll see about that,” Sapic commented, snickering drunkly into her mug. “Even you’re a troublemaker, Den,” she teased knowingly.

Den rolled their eyes, “you know what I meant.”

Sapic’s smile faded slightly into something more serious. She did know what Den meant, and though some of the memories of this afternoon may be fuzzy from the alcohol, she still did her best to make a mental note of all this; if she didn’t second-guess herself later, she may have other things to bring up later herself, and Varick might too. Boundaries were important to discuss. Zevas nodded again, leaning back in his chair slightly.

Conversation didn’t last long after that, as their food was delivered and hunger set in to chase away the awkward tension. It wasn’t gone completely, just as the phantom pains and nightmares could not be removed so easily, but even a brief conversation as that one alleviated some discomfort amongst the group, creating more understanding between them. The topic was changed, and when they finished eating they could go out to see the chancellors, get more things to do, take their minds off of past struggles for a little while.

They could breathe again.


End file.
